


Is There Somewhere?

by cyrene



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Adam Parrish is Bad at Feelings, Alternate Universe - Veronica Mars Fusion, Everyone Has Issues, Everyone Needs A Hug, F/M, Joseph Kavinsky is His Own Warning, M/M, Ronan Lynch is Bad at Feelings, What Was I Thinking?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-03
Updated: 2018-07-03
Packaged: 2019-06-04 22:05:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,172
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15156590
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cyrene/pseuds/cyrene
Summary: There are only two kinds of people in Henrietta, Virginia: millionaires, and the people who work for them. But then there’s Adam Parrish. Only Adam is either clever enough, or stupid enough, to try to breach that divide.





	Is There Somewhere?

**Author's Note:**

> WTF am I even doing? Like, what right do I have?

Motels never look like the choice of winners, but the Camelot Motel takes the sleaze bar and sets it for all other motels. The establishment squats – in all its squalid, two-story glory – on a godforsaken plot of cracked cement just far enough outside of town to be considered discreet by its customers.

 

Adam Parrish sits – in all his squalid, trailer park glory – in a _fine_ example of the American automotive industry, in the most remote spot of the parking lot, his camera zoomed onto door number five.

 

“Jesus Christ,” he mutters to the occupants, who cannot hear him anyway, “would you get on with it?” He casts a regretful eye to the Latin textbook occupying the passenger seat and sighs again. It’s going to be a late night. Even later, if the cheating asshole in room five doesn’t hurry his business along.

 

Ten minutes later they’re finally done, and Adam gets a couple of good shots of the douchebag and his secretary. They were stupid enough to share a really good hands-on kiss on the way to their separate vehicles. Adam would laugh, if it hadn’t been so gross to watch. This guy’s wife, whoever she is, is going to win the pre-nup game. Adam assumes there is a pre-nup, anyway. There are only two kinds of people in Henrietta and this guy doesn’t look like Adam’s kind.

 

Mission complete, Adam waits for the couple to make some distance so he can leave too. While he’s waiting, he calls work.

 

“What?” an irritated voice demands.

 

He looks at the phone in surprise. “Blue? What’re you doing answering the phones?”

 

“I’m asking myself the same thing,” Blue answers loudly, presumably directing the comment to one of her myriad female relatives. “You need something?”

 

“Just tell Calla I got the shot, and I’m on my way to drop off the camera, the car, and the phone.”

 

There is some kind of struggle taking place on the other end of the line. A rustling noise, a loud feline cry of protest, then – “You know, you can drop them off after school tomorrow. Then you’ll be awake enough to tell them you can’t do this stuff anymore. Unless they up your regular pay, enough to justify you doing P.I. work under age without a license, and provide a company cell phone.”

 

Adam sighs. “Blue...” It means a lot of things all at once, all of which Adam has said before, and none of which he has the energy to impart in full right now.

 

“I know, I know,” she huffs. He imagines her standing in the phone-sewing-cats room, adjusting one of the army of clips she requires to keep hair out of her face, and rolling her eyes at his obstinacy. “But I had to try, because there isn’t enough of you to unionize. You’re supposed to be a secretary. Not a filler for when Orla has a date and didn’t _check the schedule_! Though, in a house of psychics, you would think that _wouldn’t be necessary_!”

 

Loud again. The object of her ire must be Orla. If Orla is home this early, it must have been a really bad date, and Adam is going to be up all night for nothing. Adam grits his teeth and takes a deep breath through his nose.

 

“You could always do it instead,” Adam says, because he’s done with this conversation. He’s already thinking about conjugating Latin verbs.

 

“Ha!” Blue laughs. “The only thing worse than being a psychic.”

 

Adam starts the car. “Tell Calla I’ll be there in five.”

 

 

***

 

 

The next morning, while Adam is biking to school, he imagines what it would be like to drive instead. It’s a stupid game to play, one that carves a hole of longing in his chest, but he can’t help it. Blue made an offhand comment about him borrowing the car until after school, and now he’s thinking about having a car. Not that he would have borrowed the psychics’. The only thing worse than biking to school would be parking a borrowed American thing between two expensive European things.

 

There are only two kinds of people in Henrietta, Virginia: millionaires, and the people who work for them. But then there’s Adam Parrish. Only Adam is either clever enough, or stupid enough, to try to breach that divide.

 

Not that anyone is proud of him for doing so well for himself, and getting into the prestigious Aglionby Academy. The nobility treat him like a presumptuous peasant, and the peasantry treat him like a traitorous snob. Except for the women of 300 Fox Way, who treat him like a secretary and emergency money-shot-grabber. That, at least, is as it should be.

 

Adam likes that job, and not just because it’s less exhausting than the trailer factory or the garage. Being around that many women who could all be described in terms like _vivacious_ and _eccentric_ is its own special kind of exhausting. No, he likes it because working at a private investigator’s office is like being offered a rare glimpse into the natural state of humanity. Adam sees people as they really are, with all pretense stripped: grasping, lying, and cheating. It’s a kind of comfort he had never dreamed of when he was younger.

 

Adam closes his locker and heads to first period, stifling a monumental yawn despite the two cups of coffee he had before he left this morning. He hears an angry shout behind him -- “ _LYNCH!_ ” -- and someone knocks him into the lockers as they’re passing by. The contact point is his left shoulder, on an already existing bruise, and the pain of it makes him hiss.

 

“Namaste and shit, Kavinsky, you nearly killed Parrish.”

 

Kavinsky snorts, adjusting his ridiculous sunglasses. “And, what? It throws off the poverty level?”

 

Of course it’s Joseph Kavinsky and Ronan Lynch. Every school has its obligatory psychotic jackass, but Aglionby is for the elite – they have two. Kavinsky and Lynch are constantly in some kind of sick, bizarre competition to see who’s the winner, who’s the more fucked up. Like twin suns circling each other, everyone waiting for the day they collide in a fiery explosion.

 

Adam – always brave and cool – walks away before they decide to get in a fist-fight in the halls or something. Because the last thing his morning needs is for him to become a casualty of war.

 

 

***

 

 

The other reason Adam likes his P.I. job best has to do with the bathrooms at Aglionby. That actually sounds much shadier – and much, _much_ gayer – than it is. Somehow, word got around that the token poor boy was in the biz, and now the other students seek Adam out. The bathroom thing is really mostly because it’s private there. That’s good for business, though, so Adam finds himself spending a lot of time there between classes and stuff.

 

It works like this:

 

Adam Parrish is in the bathroom. Maybe he’s washing his hands, because this time he actually did have to go. (He is not looking at his reflection, because he looks like shit gone cold most days, and that’s just depressing.)

 

In walks Richie Rich. The name doesn’t matter; the names change, but the bank accounts are all the same. To be honest, most of the boys look vaguely alike too, and not just because of the uniforms. It’s a clean-cut, well-fed self-assurance that can’t be fabricated. Adam would know.

 

“Parrish, I need your help,” Richie says. Then he adds that something of his has been stolen or is missing, or he wants a dirty background check on his parents, or something trivial.

 

“I can do that,” Adam replies, and quotes him a price. The price means nothing to these trust-fund babies, but everything to a boy with only a partial scholarship and bills to pay at home, who maybe wants a car someday. When the job requires accessing the databases, Blue jumps in with the passwords and gets her cut, because as much as she doesn’t want to go into either of her family’s businesses, waitressing doesn’t pay a lot.

 

Richie Rich pays without a second thought, Adam does the job, and everyone walks away happy. It’s a beautiful example of commensalism.

 

 

***

 

 

Adam’s association with the Richiest of Riches – literally named Richard Campbell Gansey III – begins with a damsel in distress scenario. The damsel, in this case, is Gansey.

 

It’s after school, and Adam is biking to the garage. The heat of summer hasn’t quite given way to autumn yet. On his side of the road a car is stopped, its owner staring at the engine with his hands on his hips, like perhaps the car itself is going to explain what his next step should be. Adam recognizes the obscenely orange Camaro, and its owner, because who at Aglionby doesn’t? What he can’t explain is why he stops, why he asks if Gansey needs help. It’s not like an Aglionby boy can’t afford a tow truck or a mechanic, and Adam could probably be getting paid to fix this clunker.

 

He can’t regret it, though, because the way Gansey peers over Adam’s shoulder as if he’s taking notes, the perceptive questions he asks, his yearning, friendly tone, they mark him: this boy is not your typical raven boy. Somehow, he is fundamentally different.

 

The next day, when Gansey catches him at lunch, Adam is fully prepared to hear the words, “Parrish, I need your help.” What comes out instead is, “Adam, my good man, what do you know about Welsh kings?” and Adam is so surprised that it takes him a minute to answer. It’s a short answer, because Adam knows nothing about Welsh kings, and he tries not to look too ashamed of this as Gansey tells him a story.

 

It’s just the two of them, sitting alone at one of the blue metal lunch tables outside, surrounded by the susurrus of teenage boys at play. It’s an interesting story. The part of Adam’s brain that thrives on puzzles perks up with each new piece Gansey gives him, and against his will he is hooked.

 

Their discussion is cut off abruptly by the sounds of shouting nearby. Gansey stops speaking when he hears a shout of, “LYNCH!” and he worries his bottom lip with his thumb before rising.

 

“I regret that we will have to continue this another time. I have to take care of this.” His voice is uncomfortably formal, but filled with hope. He isn’t making a statement; he is asking Adam a question.

 

Adam nods, because of course he wants to continue this, but everyone knows that Gansey is the only one with a prayer of putting a leash on Ronan Lynch, and that he makes it his business to keep Lynch out of trouble as often as possible. If Gansey were getting graded on it, he would receive a D, but it would still be the best grade in the class by far. There’s only so much that can be done there.

 

Almost compulsively, Adam makes his way to the library, where he finds himself looking up Welsh kings.

 

 

***

 

 

Gansey is not willing to forget about Adam, which really eats into the “aloof and friendless” vibe Adam’s been giving off. Suddenly they’re having lunch together, and catching up between classes. Suddenly, Adam has a ride to work most days, which makes things uncomfortable at home when Adam’s parents find out. It was bad enough going to Aglionby, without actually being accepted into the flock of S.R.F.’s.

 

All this interaction is punctuated by discussion of the Welsh King Project, and Adam can’t help but be pleased with how little of himself is actually being put into the friendship. It’s almost like it’s his brain that matters, and not where he sleeps at night.

 

It’s also how he formally meets Obligatory Psychotic Jackass Number Two.

 

It’s at lunch, the third time Gansey calls Adam over to sit with him. Adam hesitates this time, because sitting next to Gansey is Ronan Lynch.

 

Sitting is not the right word. Lounging, perhaps. Slouching, in contempt of the establishment all around him.

 

He is gnawing, in a thoroughly unattractive manner, on a group of five leather bands tied around his wrist. His blue eyes flick up to Adam as he sits down, then away again. His expression is two parts boredom and one part anger, and Adam can’t help but wonder what he’s done to deserve either. The most psychotic thing about Ronan Lynch is how desperate the people he hates are for him to like them in return. Adam tells himself that he is the exception to this rule.

 

Gansey and Adam talk about school. Lynch says nothing, and chews at his wrist. Gansey and Adam talk about Glendower, the Welsh king. Lynch says nothing, and throws a whole apple at another student passing by, one of Kavinsky’s gang. Gansey and Adam talk about car repair. Lynch says nothing, and shoves his lunch tray over to Adam’s side of the table. Adam slides it back without looking, and Lynch stops it with his hand, the jolt going up Adam’s arm.

 

“I don’t want it,” Lynch finally speaks, through a mouthful of leather. “Go ahead.”

 

Adam, having long finished his lonely ham and cheese loaf sandwich, is still hungry of course. The smell of leftover french fries is tempting, but he’ll be damned if he lets anyone know it. He ignores Lynch’s only contribution to the conversation.

 

 

***

 

 

In an attempt to persuade Adam to go out on a fact-finding expedition with them, Gansey later tells Adam that Lynch likes him. Adam, understandably, laughs at this.

 

“I know it’s hard to tell with him,” Gansey insists, “but believe me, if Ronan didn’t like you, you would know it.”

 

 

***

 

 

The chill of November is easily enough to cut through Adam’s worn coat. His hands are shoved in his pockets, as much to cover up the missing fingertip on the middle finger of his left glove as to keep them warm, but also because it makes him look like he could give less of a fuck. That’s an aesthetic Adam could really use right now.

 

The party rages on around him, teens from both Aglionby and Mountain View mixing pleasantly thanks to alcohol. (And probably drugs.) Nobody comes within ten feet of the road, where Adam stands in the middle of a semi-circle of cars with five angry guys staring at him.

 

“I don’t have all fucking day, Parrish,” Kavinsky says, his tone at odds with his statement.

 

Adam takes a deep breath. Be cool, Parrish. Be very, very cool.

 

“Guess where I found this?” Adam asks, pulling a roll of cash out of his right pocket. It’s as thick as the length of his fucking thumb, and Adam would be lying if he said he hadn’t thought about just keeping it and telling them he couldn’t solve the case.

 

“Lynch’s ass?” one of Kavinsky’s cronies cackles.

 

Lynch’s reply is, like, 80% curse words, and only 20% actual words.

 

“Surprisingly no,” Adam deadpans. He looks Lynch up and down slowly. “He looks like an evil-doer. Smells like an evil-doer. But this time... not so much. Lynch is no idiot. Your thief, however...” Adam’s gaze roams across them all (and he’d be lying again if he said he wasn’t enjoying the moment of suspenseful drama) then settles on one, “really, really is. Never mind why you did it, Garren, though you obviously don’t need the money. Why didn’t you even try to hide it?”

 

Garren pales. “How did you get into my locker?”

 

Adam can’t help but smirk a little, because _really_? Who did he think he was dealing with?

 

“Seriously?” Kavinsky cuts in before Adam can say anything. “This is Adam-fucking-Parrish. Skov, Swan, take care of this. Parrish –” Kavinsky trades the roll of money Adam produced for a smaller one. “Lynch... time to ride.”

 

As he pockets his pay, Adam eyes Lynch from his peripheral vision, notes the way his spine straightens a little and his eyes shine with anticipation. Adam turns to leave before things really start happening, but a hand grips his elbow. Adam, in a moment of panic, hisses and rips his arm free.

 

“Whoa!” Lynch holds his hands up. “Just wanted to say thanks, Parrish.”

 

“It was just a job,” Adam says, willing his heart rate to even out.

 

“You could have kept the cash,” Lynch points out. “It’s five times what you earned.”

 

Adam leans in a little, lowering his voice. “But then you wouldn’t be in school on Monday, to enjoy the look on Garren’s face when Headmaster Childs finds a cock-shaped bong in his locker.” Garren wouldn’t be calling Adam Parrish “Trailer Park” any time in the near future.

 

Lynch’s eyes widen in disbelief, then a slow grin breaks out over his face. “Remind me never to piss you off, Parrish,” he says with a barking laugh. “You’re a dangerous man.”

 

Adam smiles now, pride thrumming through his veins at the notion of surprising someone like Ronan Lynch.

 

Lynch holds his hand up very obviously, then slowly lowers it to grab Adam’s elbow again. “Come on,” he says, pulling Adam along beside him.

 

“Come on, what?” Adam demands, pulling against the force.

 

Ronan yanks open the passenger door of his charcoal grey BMW. “Get in the car, loser.”

 

There is no reasonable protest Adam can make, as his only other option is walking the five miles home. Lynch is still grinning as he starts the car, his knifelike mouth somewhat less intimidating while he and Adam are on the same side. The BMW roars to life. Next to it, Kavinsky revs his engine – an invitation, or a warning.

 

Lynch tells Adam to hold on, and then they’re _flying_.

 

 

***

 

 

Adam tells Lynch to drop him off at the entrance to the trailer park. Partly this is so the engine won’t wake up his father, but partly so he doesn’t have to see Lynch’s pity when faced with Adam’s home in all its glory.

 

Adam barely makes a sound as he enters the house at one-thirty A.M. Barely isn’t quiet enough for his father.

 

By the time Monday rolls around, the bruises have settled into their worst. Lynch takes one look at Adam’s face, lets loose a stream of curse words, and storms off. Gansey goes full-on Gansey about it, complete with lip rubbing and that frown line between his brows, until Adam snaps at him and makes his own furious exit.

 

He had thought it would be just that easy to lose his only two friends. Theoretically, it should have been. But later that day, Gansey walks up to him and tentatively brings up the Glendower project. Later that night, Ronan shows up at Boyd’s – and Adam doesn’t even remember if he mentioned working there – and practically demands that Adam let Ronan teach him to fight. He accepts Gansey’s offer, but declines Ronan’s as politely as he is capable of, which is to say they have another argument.

 


End file.
